Occurred to the shaky new father holding it (6)
I believe the answer is:
dawned
'occurred to the shaky new' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'father holding it' is the wordplay.
'father' becomes 'dad' (informal term for father).
'holding' is an insertion indicator.
'it' becomes 'wne' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'dad' placed around 'wne' is 'DAWNED'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for dawned that I've seen before include "Became clear like the rising sun" , "'Fell into place, sank in (6)'" .)